


Bravo Company Adopts Two Kittens!

by Arwen88



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Cats, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:53:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24236836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arwen88/pseuds/Arwen88
Summary: Brad stopped in front of Ray, waiting for his friend to lift his eyes to him before he raised in rapid succession the two kitties he had in his hands.“Meet Boogeyman and Predator.”
Comments: 16
Kudos: 37
Collections: Loose Lips Sink Ships Prompt Meme





	Bravo Company Adopts Two Kittens!

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the GDR of LDF, prompts "Boogeyman" and "Predator", and for the LLSS meme, prompt "Bravo Company adopts a kitten!"
> 
> Thanks to miette for betareading this! <3

Brad wasn’t really sure how long Ray had been sitting in the same spot, but he was already leaning back against the humvee’s wheel when Brad went around the base for an inspection with a few other officers. He was still there when he got back.

He would have thought the man was sleeping it off, but Ray not only had his eyes open, but the same vacant look in his eyes that he had had basically since they had reached Baghdad.

If there was something Brad didn’t want to happen - beside the situation becoming an even worse shitshow that it already was - was to to see his men crash and burn like he knew others were going to soon start doing. It always happened after missions, and he hoped he could find a way to avoid it at least for his team.

He stopped in front of Ray, waiting for his friend to lift his eyes to him before he raised in rapid succession the two kitties he had in his hands.

“Meet Boogeyman and Predator.”

He smirked a tiny bit at the surprise written on Ray’s face, all his apathy disappearing at the sight of the two kittens, one black and one orange.

They were terribly small, and Brad wasn’t sure if it was because they were simply too young or because they had not had much to eat lately, but they fit in his hands with a lot of space to spare, and they mewed too high pitched for his taste.

And yet. Nothing like a furry friend to take care of when you barely felt worthy of taking care of yourself.

“Where did you find them?” Ray asked, perking up a little, more interested than he had seemed to be in anything in a long while.

“Back at the eastern gate, think the mom has left them for good.” He went down on a knee in front of his friend, letting him watch the kitties more carefully.

He stroked his thumb over the back of the orange one while Ray smiled softly at the yawning black kitten.

“D’you like Boogeyman?”

“Yeah,” Ray snorted, smiling at the little beast.

“Good.” Brad nodded curtly. “‘cause I’m not going to manage taking care of both. Think you can manage him?”

Ray raised his eyes on him, even more surprised than before, but he started gently taking the kitten out of Brad’s hand even before he started answering. “Yeah, man, leave him to me.” He nodded with a smile, stroking his thumbs over the cheeks of the cat, looking more alive than he had in days.

“Heads up, I’ll probably drop Predator on you too while I’m on watch.”

“Yeah, no problem,” Ray chuckled. “D’you think they’re already on solid food or still on milk?” he asked softly, directed at Brad even though he didn’t take his eyes off the kitten he was gently petting. “Maybe I should ask Doc to get a look at him and see if he’s safe.”

“That’s not a bad idea. And I don’t know about milk or what else. Let me know if you find out?”

Ray nodded vaguely, and Brad stood up to go look for a crate or something to keep the kitten in when they were going to move away from there.

***

If Brad had expected Espera to know about kittens - he was a family man, right? - he was decidedly surprised to find out that it was Manimal the real expert.

Apparently the man had had almost five cats growing up.

Apparently he was also in severe need of something to do that would take his mind off the divorce. Or so Brad summarized when Manimal took charge of feeding Predator some milk through a little hole at the end of a plastic glove, probably lent by Doc Bryan.

Brad observed carefully, wanting to know how to do it himself, but remained silent and let the man do it, listening to Manimal instruct Ray how to do the same to Boogeyman.

Turned out Manimal had several stories to tell about cats being dipshits. Adorable, but crazy dipshits nonetheless.

At least he had stopped talking about shooting his wife and her lawyer, and Brad considered that a victory in itself.

***

The guys seemed to collectively decide that the two kitties were common property.

Brad decided to let them do this, leaving them Predator while he busied himself with inventorying and writing reports about their mission.

Not to mention the fact that everybody seemed elated at the chance to have a turn at playing with them.

“Hey, Reporter! Take a picture!” Espera requested with a grin, wearing his thick gloves while he played with the kitten.

Predator was holding on to his fingers with his front paws, playfully biting at them and intermittently kicking at his palm with his rear paws.

Lilley chuckled while Reporter took a picture of Predator and Espera together.

“Finally a picture I can show my family!” Espera chuckled. “My wife is gonna go crazy for it. Women love that kind of stuff.”

“Really?” Trombley asked with a certain surprise, considering the kitten with a little frown.

“Yeah. Cats, dogs, girls love that. Even more if coupled with a sexy man.”

“I don’t like dogs.” Trombley frowned harder.

“Why am I not surprised?” Ray huffed, playing with Boogeyman. “You’re not sharing him with me. Boogeyman only likes me,” he cooed at the kitten, which interrupted its pawing at Ray’s pencil to yawn.

“Yeah, he only likes to sleep, more likely.”

“Are you going to take him back with us?” Trombley asked, trying to reach out and touch Predator, only for the kitten to turn around and bite his finger too.

“Yeah, man. He’s mine now. We’ll get them a box, maybe one of those pet carriers at the airport, and we’ll get them home with us.” Ray smirked, seemingly a lot more like himself than he was a couple days before.

***

Brad was checking on the guys when he noticed Walt still up, his headlamp turned on as he - like many others during those days - tried finally writing a letter home.

It didn’t look like he was having particular success in his endeavor though, and as Brad closed in on him, he could see the vacant stare in Walt’s eyes. Brad was quite sure about what he could have been thinking about; Walt had never managed to let go of the incident with the car.

“Walt.” He nodded at his gunner, studying the way Walt snapped his gaze up, almost startled. “Letter home?” he asked, trying to sound as approving as he could.

Instead, Walt pressed his lips in a thin line and gave a little nod. “Yeah. Still don’t know what to tell them though.” He let his gaze slide away from Brad, looking towards the high walls of the farm, and the tracer fire of weapons they could get glimpses of in the night. “We’ll soon be back too. Not sure what I’ll tell them then either.”

Brad nodded slowly, observing him, and he reached out to squeeze his shoulder gently. “Something will come to you.”

Walt nodded slightly, clearly not really listening to him, and Brad left him to himself.

Only to go looking for Ray.

Boogeyman spent so much time sleeping during the day that it wasn’t much of a surprise that he would stay up for a good part of the night. So it was almost safe to assume he would be up, unlike Predator.

Ray had his eyes close when Brad approached him, but he looked up at hearing his steps, raising his eyebrows in a silent question. Brad simply shook his head, because they didn’t have to move out yet. Instead he looked at Boogeyman, contentedly grooming itself while perched on top of Ray’s chest.

He didn’t really have to explain too much, or even ask Ray to do something specifically, it was just enough to tell his friend that Walt was still restless and up, stressing over what to tell his wife and family.

Ray barely nodded, grabbing Brad’s hand to let the man help him on his feet, and then he was off towards Walt, Boogeyman curiously peeking out above Ray’s arm.

“Hey, Walt, you still up?” Ray yawned, catching the other’s attention, and Walt gave a little nod, his gaze going from Ray to the kitten in his arms. “Something important there?”

“Just a letter home.” Walt shrugged, putting away the still blank piece of paper.

“Here, can you keep Boogeyman for me tonight?” Ray asked, already handing him the kitten, and Walt blinked at him. “I just want to sleep and he keeps fussing. Since you’re up and about…”

“Oh.” It was all Walt was able to say at first, but then he gently took the offered kitten, and the shadow of a smile appeared on his lips as Boogeyman started sniffing at his fingers. “Yeah, sure, man.” He smiled at the little creature when the kitten started licking at his fingers in approval.

Brad did another round before going to sleep himself, just to make sure there were no strange activities going on, and he smiled a bit at finding Walt finally asleep, Boogeyman curled up against his throat, purring in its sleep.

***

Doc Bryan was admittedly always looking pretty angry with the world, but since they were going around Baghdad and not fixing anything, barely giving him the time to check on kids that he could clearly not save, he was looking murderous and very, very done with the whole military system.

But at the moment, he was busy glaring at Ray, who was holding both kittens in his hands. “I’m a doctor, not a vet!” 

Ray stared right back, undeterred, or at least looking as if he couldn’t see the difference in the two professions.

“Yes, but. Do you know if they got worms or anything?”

“And how am I supposed to do a check up on a kitten? I can barely do a check up on you- and you, I already know you got problems.” But he still grabbed a couple rubber gloves despite his grumbling, taking a gentle hold of one of the kitties to look at it with a frown. “Years of medical school to know what humans might have means shit when you have to deal with a whole different organism. And you can bet they have worms. You can bet we got worms too. Probably our food’s got worms too.”

Ray made a face at him, but still switched one kitten with the other when Bryan gave him the first back.

“They don’t have fleas, and that’s just as good cause if they did you’d probably have it too by now.” Doc Bryan threw him a mixed look of disgust and anger, but he kept checking the kitten with gentle fingers. “No, no,” he murmured at the kitten when Predator tried biting his fingers and latching onto one.

“Oh, yeah, we’ve been using latex gloves to feed them.” Ray smirked, understanding why the kitten was acting that way, and he noticed how Doc Bryan stilled for a moment before slowly shaking his head, a little smile on his lips at the kitten convinced Doc was going to feed it.

“Stupid little creatures,” he mumbled, even while rubbing a finger over Predator’s belly. “You could probably get them checked back in Kuwait, also buy meds for them if you’re still set on taking them home.”

“Sounds good to me.” Ray shrugged, taking back the mewing nuisance. “Thanks, Doc.” He nodded at the corpsman before going back to his unit.

It would have been faster without the guys from Alpha surrounding him to get a chance at petting the kittens, and at first Ray tried sending them back empty handed, just because the kittens were Bravo’s. But, as he told the guys, “You’re lucky I’m a softy”. So he got stuck there as the Alpha guys made various unmanly noises at the kittens, taking pictures of the kittens in their arms or over their shoulders just like Bravo had been doing for days up to that point.

So it was quite later when Ray got back to his unit, walking straight to Brad, who was writing stuff down.

“Doc Bryan is not a vet,” he informed Brad very seriously.

Brad stared at him for a couple seconds, almost waiting for something else to come out of Ray’s mouth, but then he snorted. “No shit, Sherlock. Did you find out that all by yourself? You’re a gift to first recon.”

Ray huffed and handed over Predator. “Your baby is hungry.”

“Of course he is.” Brad smirked softly, gently taking the kitten and putting it down between his feet where the kitten got to play with the strings of his boots.

“He’s also not full of lice. But we all probably got worms.”

“Wouldn’t be surprised,” Brad sighed tiredly, going back to his work.

***

After getting off the Ripped Fuel and the sleep deprivation, Ray had seemed to start spiraling down at first, and Brad had been truly worried for him, but since he had had a kitten to take care of, it was almost as if he was more himself, more like the guy that Brad used to know before their deployment there.

He was glad he had thought about giving Boogeyman to his friend, if not for nothing else for the little affectionate smile that Ray had on his face as he gently brushed a toothbrush over the fur of the kitten, simulating the grooming that the mother would have done if she were still around.

Brad waited for Ray to be done - which wasn’t until Boogeyman fell asleep, relaxed and content on Ray’s chest - to borrow the toothbrush from him and let Predator sniff it good until the toothbrush was declared cool once more.

Then he set himself into grooming his Predator, finally Brad relaxing too after a long day while Predator closed his eyes in bliss as the soft brushes cleaned him up.

Brad chuckled softly, making a little crest on top of Predator’s head, but then he went back to brushing his fur the right direction, happy to hear his soft purring.

***

They had left the kittens with Nate, while it was their turn to get to the toilets and to buy a coffee at the airport’s coffee shop, not really minding too much when the lieutenant said he wasn’t a cat person. After all, the kittens were in the pet carrier, and it wasn’t like he was forced to pet them, or feed them, just make sure nobody would steal their stuff, while the others roamed around the airport, waiting for their commercial flight back into the States.

Brad wasn’t too surprised, though, to come back to find that the kittens had been let free from the carrier; he was a little surprised to find Nate clearly holding back tears while the two kittens licked his chin and neck, their little claws stuck in his uniform to prevent him removing them from the spot on his chest.

Their purring was loud enough that Brad heard it even before sitting back down beside the lieutenant.

“I’m not equipped for this,” Nate mumbled, not looking his way, gently petting the backs of the kittens.

“For the quickest conversion into being a cat person you could imagine?” Brad cracked a smile, opening a packet of cookies.

Nate kept silent for a moment before tilting his head slightly, closing his eyes when Predator moved into licking at his cheek. “Being happy, I guess? Maybe going home in general.” He sighed.

Brad hummed softly, knowing what he meant, and yet fully aware that the toll must have been even harder on Nate, constantly trying to manage all of Bravo and keep shit from rolling too hard on all of them.

It had been clear as day how the lieutenant had grown disillusioned with the Corps with the progress of their mission. Now it was quite clear to Brad that he wouldn’t have stayed in the Corps, without the need for Nate to say so. Quite honestly, Brad thought it would have been for the best, seeing the path the Corps were taking, seemingly not valuing enough the people that truly cared about their subordinates.

And yet he couldn’t help but worry that getting out of the Corps would hit Nate just as much, if not harder, than staying.

“I don’t think anybody is ever just ready to go back home,” he admitted slowly, a little frown pulling at his brow. “We should get you some cat therapy too for when you’re back home. Helps put stuff into perspective. Also gives you reasons to do stuff.”

Nate scoffed softly, but there was a little smile playing on his lips. “That easy?”

“No. But it helps. And everybody needs a little help.”


End file.
